These Boozy Popsicles are Creating Controversy in Sweden

The Swedish do not play when it comes to booze – their alcohol laws are famously strict – but an ice cream company has found a brilliant but controversial way to circumvent the law.

The ice cream brand N1ce launched liquor-flavored ice cream and ice pops about a year ago. While the products contain 5% alcohol “for taste,” they are classified as food and not alcohol, and are, therefore, covered by food law, allowing it to be purchase in grocery stores.

These popsicles are gaining popularity, and with it, controversy. They are now also found in Danish shops, where children have access to purchase. “They are covered by an EU rule that allows shops to legally sell products with up to five percent alcohol to children, but we are asking Danes to follow the country’s 16-year-old rule,” says founder Mikael Drane, who has launched the product with the Swedish DJ-duo Axwell & Ingrosso, told Metroxpress.

"The legislation is not adapted to the fact that alcohol can be served in forms other than as a beverage. We certainly see it as a problem, because marketing may hit children and young people," Kristina Wallin, a lawyer at the Swedish Consumer Agency, told Swedish public broadcaster SVT, regarding issues inherent in the current alcohol act.

It’ll take a lot of 5% alcohol popsicles to get anyone drunk, but the alcohol and sugar combo will definitely not help get kids to bed at night.